OBJECTIVE OR SUBJECTIVEWHAT IS THE TRUE NATURE OF REALITY?

As I see it, there are only two viable possibilities for the nature of
reality and how it relates to our personal experience of life. Either
reality is completely external to us - something we are born into and
have very limited control over. Or, it is entirely internal, meaning
all of reality is a projection of
our inner being.

The first view is known as Objective
Reality, the other describes Subjective Reality, or Solipsism. These
are the two extreme and polar positions. It is possible to
posit
a third alternative of some combination of external and internal, but
for reasons I will elucidate in a bit, I do not believe that is a
viable possibility.

So why is the question of the true nature of reality even important?
Because how we answer this question determines everything - literally
EVERYTHING we experience on personal, cultural and global scales.

Conscious Critters

You are a conscious critter - you are aware of yourself as a
distinct
entity. We humans are all conscious critters, with varying degrees of
self-awareness. All of our experiences are filtered through our
consciousness for interpretation, evaluation and response. Therefore,
the only way we are capable of knowing reality is through the mediation
of our consciousness - that is, subjectively.

This has led to what is known in philosophy as the Problem of
Other
Minds. We experience our own consciousness directly, but we
cannot
directly experience the consciousness of someone else. We can only
infer their consciousness from their behaviors. We can't crack open
their skulls and peer inside to see what they are really thinking. Nor
can we perform a Vulcan Mind Meld to join consciousnesses with others.
And science is no help here, because it can't even figure out what
consciousness is, much less how it relates to reality. So while it
might seem reasonable to assume that others are conscious, we really
have no way of proving it without using consciousness as the primary
means to determine consciousness - a bootstrap maneuver if I ever heard
one!

So, if there is no way to prove that other people are conscious, to
assume that they are is a huge leap of faith based on some pretty shaky
evidence. Yet our culture makes this assumption and even takes it
farther. Not only does mainstream society believe that everyone, all 7
billion of us, are conscious, it also assumes that all of reality
(other consciousness & all) are located outside of us. In other
words, we were born into this already on-going reality that
has been
cranking along for billion of years, and we have very limited influence
on this external reality that existed long before us and will continue
to exist long after we are gone.

Each of these conscious critters, according to mainstream thought, has
its own subjective way of experiencing the world and interpreting those
experiences, but somehow, we manage to agree enough on our
interpretations to mostly get along. It is where our interpretations of
our experiences differ that we clash. Nobody knows where our
consciousness comes from or really how or why it functions. But we all
seem to have one and they are all different and unique.

So, according to mainstream thought, we all are trapped alone inside
our own subjective minds while also being thrown into an external
reality that we have very little control over. Sounds pretty sucky to
me. Now mainstream thought does not offer any explanations why this
should be so, nor any proof. All it does is assume and assert this is
"how it is - like it or lump it."

But what if this assumption is wrong?

Subjective Reality: the Alternate Possibility

Subjective Reality, aka solispism, monism, and God-realization, does
not assume there is an external reality. This view holds that
consciousness is all there is, and that all consciousness is unitive -
that is, there are no pesky other minds to become a problem. There is
only one ultimate mind that is the source and originator of all
subjective experience - as the Hare Krishnas would say, one 'Ultimate
Enjoyer,' and it is YOU.

Not your ego-self you, or your physical body you, but rather the
consciousness which is observing and experiencing you. What I like to
call the Inner Being or Inner Self. It is this Inner Being which is the
Ultimate Consciousness. Most of us are only dimly aware of this inner
self, because unless conscious effort is made to contact it, it is
content to sit and watch and enjoy the ride. This inner being you is
the source and creator, as well as experiencer, of your existence,
according to this view.

Subjective reality only takes as real what it experiences first-hand,
since external or objective reality is not seen as a reliable report,
coming from second-hand sources. This approach is also known as
Gnosticism - the seeking of direct knowledge (Gnosis), rather than
accepting external reports as knowledge without personal experience.

It is just as impossible to provide proof of the validity of subjective
reality as it is to prove objective reality, as any proof I could give
would just be a second-hand report, not first-hand experience. BUT...
The subjective reality model DOES solve several problems that the
objective model of reality can't. For example, subjective reality
solves the Problem of Other Minds by saying that there AREN'T any other
minds - we just think there are. And this also explains why we do not
have direct access to the minds of others (like through mind melds or
some technology) - because there's nothing there to access except
ourselves.

"OK", I hear you say, "if I am the only consciousness
that exists,
how
come I don't know all this directly?"

Because that would spoil the fun! Where would be the mystery in
discovering yourself if you already knew before you started? Also, we
are brainwashed at an early age by our culture that punishes us harshly
if we dare to posit a different interpretation of reality.

"But", I hear you ask, "if I am all that exists, that
is, if my
inner
being is the source of all of my experience, then why would I put
myself through all the misery and suffering of ignorance and fear? Why
would I create an environment hostile to learning about my own true
nature? If I am the source of everything, and everything is set up to
somehow benefit me, how am I benefited by experiencing fear, loneliness
and weakness?"

This is a major question for the subjective approach to answer. Many
dismiss consideration of the subjective approach because they cannot
imagine a satisfactory response to these very valid questions.

And this is where objectivity fails. For any response I give to you
will be necessarily a second-hand report, which you would still need to
verify by your own personal experience, which would necessarily be
different from my own experience. But, I am forced to turn to
subjectivity to continue the discussion. My own personal experiences
are the only thing that can convince me of the rightness or wrongness
of an approach to understanding reality. My personal experiences
support and affirm the subjective view much more than they support and
affirm the external reality view.

Philosophers (and many others, including scientists) hate and disparage
subjective reality for exactly this reason. They feel it leads to
selfishness and egoism. But, actually, if you are already everything,
what need do you have to be selfish, as you already have everything -
you just need to realize and accept it. Rather, if the true nature of
reality is unitive, then the goal becomes to actively realize its
oneness, not to further fragment it.

Don't Mess with Mr. In-Between

Why are the only choices Objective or Subjective? Why isn't there some
combination of the two - a subjective universe that still has objective
aspects. This approach doesn't make sense to me - Either I am
everything or I am not everything. Either the UNI-verse is unitive or
it is fragmented - there is no in-between. To be unitive is to be
subjective and to be objective is to be fragmented into billions of
different consciousnesses. "The One and the Many" - that ancient puzzle
of the Pre-Socratic Philosophers has never really been resolved. Is
there only one thing in the Uni-verse, or are there many things in the
Multi-verse? Is it one song or many?

Ultimately, it's up to you which reality you choose to live in, just as
it is up to me to choose my own reality.